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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26959177">Yukio, Turn On the Light</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArtemiStorm/pseuds/ArtemiStorm'>ArtemiStorm</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Ao no Exorcist | Blue Exorcist</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>1st chapter is a flashback, Aoextober, Author Is Sleep Deprived, Dialogue Heavy, Family Issues, Father-Son Relationship, Feels, Fighting, Gen, Heavy Angst, Hurt No Comfort, Lucid Dreaming, Mentions of Suicide, My First Work in This Fandom, Nightmare, Shiro is a good dad, Swearing, The Author Regrets Nothing, Tough Love, Unconditional Love, Whump, Yukio is a Little Shit, gratuitous use of capitals, hurt yukio, lots of blood, my otp is brotherly love, rin is a good brother, shouting, troubled yukio, yukio stop shooting people who love you</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 19:22:34</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>8,437</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26959177</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArtemiStorm/pseuds/ArtemiStorm</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>*UPDATE* I rewrote the last scene of chapter 5 so you might want to go back and check it out.</p><p>Almost two years after Father Fujimoto died, Yukio meets him again in the place where it all ended—and began—the sanctuary of their monastery. What should have been a happy reunion between father and son devolves into a shouting match and warps into a nightmare straight out of Gehenna.</p><p>Or</p><p>Shiro gets so fed up with Yukio’s behavior that he visits him from beyond the grave to set matters straight.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>72</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. The Imp in the House</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Takes place during Issue #125 (spoilers). </p><p>I was going to make this one long chapter but I kept getting confused so instead I'm splitting it into multi little chapters.</p><p>I do not own Ao No Exorcist or any characters.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The monastery door opened. Seven-year-old Yukio crouched down underneath the coffee table trembling and holding a kitchen knife. A tall shadowy figure shuffled in. It shed its coat and hung it on the hook in the hall. It did look similar to his father’s figure, but Yukio knew some demons were masters of illusion.</p>
<p>“Yukio?” It sounded like his father’s voice, but Yukio was suspicious. Some demons could mimic voices.</p>
<p>“Why are all the lights off?” The voice asked. Yukio didn’t answer. He scrunched as far as he could underneath the table.</p>
<p>Please, just go away! Don’t look at me! Don’t see me!</p>
<p>“Yukio, why are you hiding in the dark?” A wave of panic burst in Yukio’s heart. The demon knew his name! How? Was he going to use that knowledge to hurt him? Yukio dared to peek out. The demon stared at him, evil eyes glittering in the dim street lamp light that filtered in through the blinds.</p>
<p>“Stay back! I have a knife!” Yukio held up a small kitchen paring knife as proof.</p>
<p>“You have a knife?” The voice asked, thinking, calculating. Yukio watched the shadow, every muscle tense and ready to spring but he trembled like a weak leaf. He wasn’t sure if he could even fight if the demon came after him. He might simply melt with fear into the arms of the devil.</p>
<p>“How did you get—how did you even reach the knives?” The figure asked with an edge of unbelief in his voice. Yukio blinked, puzzled.</p>
<p>“I make sure they’re kept on the upper shelves out of reach where you and Rin can’t get your sticky hands on them.” </p>
<p>Yukio’s eyes widened. A mimicking demon wouldn’t have known where his father kept the knives. And there was only one person who called the boys’ hands sticky. </p>
<p>“Father?”</p>
<p>The figure shifted his weight turning slightly toward the lamp-lit window. It wasn’t the twisted face of a demon but definitely his father’s.</p>
<p>“Son?” He took a tentative half-step forward.</p>
<p>“Father!” Yukio cried. Shiro was at his side in an instant with an outstretched hand.</p>
<p>“Give me the knife, Yukio.” Yukio let it fall from his hand; Shiro snatched it up and tossed it away behind him.</p>
<p>“Tell me what’s wrong. Why are you hiding in the dark?” Afraid and ashamed, Yukio clammed up, trying desperately to hold back the emotions.</p>
<p>“Did a demon hurt you?” Shiro asked worriedly. Yukio shook his head and then burst into tears.</p>
<p>“I don’t want to keep seeing these scary things anymore!”</p>
<p>“I know, son, I’m sorry.”</p>
<p>“Why won’t the demons just go away?”</p>
<p>“It is just the way the world is. We’re both cursed to know the darkness. That’ll never change.” </p>
<p>“I don’t like living a cursed life like this! I’m so scared of them, Father. All the time.”</p>
<p>“You remember that demons are more active and more powerful in the dark, right?”</p>
<p>Yukio nodded.</p>
<p>“So when you got scared, why did you turn off the lights?”</p>
<p>“So I wouldn’t see them anymore,” Yukio whispered.</p>
<p>“When you turn the lights off, you give the demons power. Even if you can’t see them in the dark, they can still see you. They can still come after you and hurt you. You can’t just ignore them and hope they go away.”</p>
<p>“What am I supposed to do?”</p>
<p>“Turn the light on,” Shiro glanced up. Yukio followed his gaze to the overhead light.</p>
<p>“Go on! Go turn the light on.” Shiro pointed to the light switch near the front door. Yukio shook his head and cowered.</p>
<p>“Go on. It’s okay.”</p>
<p> “I don’t want to see that scary monster again.”</p>
<p>“…That scary monster?” Shiro asked. “What scary monster? What did it look like?”</p>
<p>“It was ugly—green with horns and fangs.”</p>
<p>“That sounds like an imp.”</p>
<p>“It came after me in the garden. I ran away inside but it followed me into the house. That’s when I turned off the light and hid. I—I don’t know where it went.” Shiro bristled.</p>
<p>“Do you think the demon could still be in the house?” He asked. Yukio nodded. Shiro looked around suspiciously around the room while fiddling with a pouch on his belt. He pulled a vial of salt, uncorked it, and poured it out in a circle around Yukio, chanting a verse. The salt circle glowed purple as a circle seal formed around him.</p>
<p>“What are you doing?” Yukio asked.</p>
<p>“Well if there’s a demon in the house, I’m gonna go look for it.”</p>
<p>“Wait! Father! Don’t leave me!”</p>
<p>“Don’t worry. The circle seal will protect you if you stay inside it, but you know the only way to defeat the darkness is to face it and turn on the light.”</p>
<p>“But…but… the light switch is way over there!”</p>
<p>“That it is.”</p>
<p>“Why can’t you go turn on the light for me?”</p>
<p>“You need to do this yourself, Yukio. I won’t always be around to help you. You need to learn to face the darkness on your own.”</p>
<p>“No! Stop! Don’t leave me!”</p>
<p>Shiro turned and walked down the hall. Yukio closed his eyes and cowered in fear.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. The Father in the Monastery</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>“Yukio.”</p>
<p>Yukio eyed Shiro critically as he wracked his memory to make sense of the situation. One minute he was seven at home, the next, he was sixteen in the monastery. What was this? Time travel? Trickery by demons? A hallucination?</p>
<p>“What are you doing?” Shiro asked. Yukio was asking himself the same question.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Yukio.”</p>
<p>Yukio’s eyes snapped open. He must have fallen asleep on the floor. His father stood over him. He was dressed as he normally did, with short white hair, long black robes, and his trademark circular glasses with their cross-bead straps, but his face had changed. His eyes were duller, his skin more wrinkled, and his hair thinner than Yukio remembered. His expression was severe. Grave even. His shoulders hunched slightly under the weight of some invisible burden. What was that? Irritation? Disappointment? Anger?</p>
<p>Yukio pushed himself to a sitting position and was surprised to find that he wasn’t seven years old anymore, cowering in the living room of his house. He was back to his sixteen-year-old self; but somehow, he’d ended up in the sanctuary of the monastery where it all ended—and began.</p>
<p><em>When am I?</em> He wondered and looked around the sanctuary.</p>
<p>Late afternoon sunlight streamed in through the partially-shattered vaulted windows and illuminated the upended pews tossed and splintered. Littered the stone blocks gashed from the walls piled randomly. Ripped-out pages from the holy books drifted downward life impossibly-slow-moving confetti. The holy water basin was upside-down halfway embedded in the wall where some demon-powered being threw it.</p>
<p>It was the monastery <em>that day.</em> The day that Father Fujimoto had died.</p>
<p>But strangely, there was no bloodstain on the floor like there should have been. Instead, the very much alive Shiro Fujimoto paced slowly through the rubble, hovering near Yukio.</p>
<p>“Yukio.”</p>
<p>Yukio eyed Shiro critically as he wracked his memory to make sense of the situation. One minute he was seven at home, the next, he was sixteen in the monastery. What was this? Time travel? Trickery by demons? A hallucination?</p>
<p>“What are you doing?” Shiro asked. Yukio was asking himself the same question.</p>
<p>Memories, fuzzy at first, then getting clearer, repainted the picture in his mind.</p>
<p>His blue eyes<em>. Lovely.</em> <em>Satan-colored.</em> The mystery of Rin and Yukio’s origin and the truth of Father Fujimoto’s. The secret purpose of the Order and the Illuminati. And the not-so-secret intentions of Satan himself…</p>
<p>“No,” Yukio said, his heart suddenly hardened.</p>
<p>“No?” Shiro echoed. Yukio could hear in his mind what he was thinking. “<em>Whaddya mean no? I didn’t ask a yes or no question. I’m lookin’ for an explanation. Not a one-word answer.”</em></p>
<p>“I’m not gonna play this game,” Yukio said, with a sharpened edge to his voice. Shiro gave him the ‘<em>don’t talk back to me, boy’</em> look.</p>
<p>“This isn’t a game, Yukio.”</p>
<p>“This isn’t real, <em>Father,</em>” Yukio spat. Shiro didn’t answer. Yukio looked away and watched the fragmented scriptures in slow-motion fall like snow.</p>
<p>“This isn’t real,” Yukio said again, as if to assure himself. He looked back to Shiro. “You’re dead.”</p>
<p>“That doesn’t mean I don’t have something to say.”</p>
<p>“Anything you say is meaningless because this is nothing more than a dream.”</p>
<p>“No,” Shiro shook his head, “this is a nightmare.”</p>
<p>“Go away. Leave me alone.”</p>
<p>“Come on, kid! I’ve been gone for almost two years now and this is how you treat me? Giving your old dad the cold shoulder?”</p>
<p>“YOU ARE NOT MY DAD!” Yukio erupted. Shiro raised an eyebrow and crossed his arms as if to say ‘<em>oh really?</em>’ Yukio continued in a more controlled manner. “I know about Section 13 and your origins. I know that you were a clone of a demon king, and not even a proper human. You may have done some good things in your life, but in the end, you were nothing more than a dog for the Order—or should I say—the Illuminati? Truth is, you were raising Rin to be your tool, a weapon, and I to be his keeper. Your father act was only an illusion at best. Nothing you say to me now has any meaning. So just leave.”</p>
<p>Shiro burst out laughing.</p>
<p>“Were you always this dark and dramatic? I know it’s been a while, but geez! So angsty! You sure do take after your dad. And by dad, I mean your birth dad. Not your real dad.”</p>
<p>“DON’T YOU DARE REFER TO YOURSELF AS OUR REAL DAD!”</p>
<p>“Bullshit. Not your real dad, my ass. Who was it that changed your diapers? Who held you for hours and hours and hours when you wouldn’t stop crying? Who watched you learn to crawl and walk and run? Was it Satan who made sure you were dressed warm enough for your first day of school? Did Satan take care of you when you were sick or hurt or scared? Did he help you become an exorcist? I can tell you that Satan sure as hell wasn’t the one to sacrifice his life to keep you and Rin safe.”</p>
<p>“Sacrifice?” Yukio snorted. “That was no sacrifice. You got what was coming to you.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>NOW… WHAT SHALL I DO?</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“HEY! YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT—”</p>
<p>“DID YOU EVEN KNOW WHAT YOU WERE DOING? You thought you were raising Rin to be a weapon for the Order but you were a fool. The Order, the Illuminati, Mephisto… they allowed Rin to live so you could raise him to be a body for Satan to inhabit.”</p>
<p>“I… don’t deny that may be Mephisto’s true intention, but it certainly wasn’t mine. I raised you and Rin to be good people who were free to live honest human lives. But if need be, I wanted you to be able to fight Satan and protect Assiah.”</p>
<p>“Even if that was your intention, how did you think Satan would let you get away with it? You playing with fire and you got burnt. That doesn’t make you a martyr.”</p>
<p>“Don’t belittle my sacrifice. And don’t twist what happened to fit your warped perception of reality.”</p>
<p>“This is pointless. I’m done here.” Yukio stood up and started to walk for the door of the sanctuary. Shiro grabbed his arm forcefully.</p>
<p>“Don’t walk away from me! I’m not done speaking yet.”</p>
<p>“Don’t be ridiculous.” Yukio yanked his arm away from him and kept walking.</p>
<p>“DON’T BE RUDE! I didn’t raise you to be a brat.”</p>
<p>“DOES ETIQUETTE REALLY MATTER IN UNREALITY?”</p>
<p>“JUST BECAUSE THIS IS A DREAM, DOESN’T MEAN THIS ISN’T REAL! Dream or no, I expect you to respect me as your elder, teacher, and father.”</p>
<p>“YOU’RE NOT MY FATHER! GO AWAY!</p>
<p>“I’M YOUR DAD WHETHER YOU LIKE IT OR NOT!”</p>
<p>“YOU’RE NOTHING MORE THAN THE SHADOW OF A MEMORY! THE GHOST OF AN IDEAL HAUNTING MY MIND IN A MOMENT OF WEAKNESS. SO STOP TRYING TO ACT LIKE MY FATHER, GET OUT OF MY HEAD, AND NEVER COME BACK!</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>SHALL I KILL EVERYONE HERE?</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Yukio, with rage in his eyes, whipped out his Armumahel pistol and pointed it at Shiro.</p>
<p>“No, don’t!” Someone—not Shiro—shouted. But who? The voice, it was familiar, but Yukio’s distracted mind couldn’t place it.</p>
<p>Shiro stared at Yukio, his expression unreadable. He took half of a step forward and started to raise his hand. Yukio pulled the trigger. Just like the slow-motion falling scraps of paper, the bullet left the barrel so slowly that they could see the rotation of the bullet as it crawled forward. His eyes went wide. Shiro easily stepped out of the way of the bullet and watched it pass. He motioned for Yukio to calm down.</p>
<p>“I can’t do what you ask,” Shiro said.</p>
<p>“And why not?” Yukio challenged.</p>
<p>“Because… you’re bleeding.”</p>
<p>Yukio was instantly aware of a warm drop, like a tear running down his face from his eye. He reached up and felt his face. When he pulled his hand away…</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Blood.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Without warning, an invisible piercing blow struck Yukio’s face. He gripped his face as he staggered and dropped to his hands and knees. He didn’t even remember letting go of the pistol but in a flash, Shiro had grabbed it and tossed it aside. Shiro didn’t say anything, but held Yukio’s shoulders steadying him.</p>
<p>In a few seconds, the pain subsided and all that remained was a dull throbbing behind his eye. Feeling physically drained, Yukio rocked back and sat on the ground, wiping his face on his wrinkled shirt sleeve leaving a spreading streak of red on the woven fabric.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>The ink I write with is the blood from my heart.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. The Boy in the Dark</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Shiro explains what really went down.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Shiro sat down heavily next to Yukio and let out a sigh. Yukio turned away from him and stared at the floor.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>KILL HIM.</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Do you remember that night?” Shiro asked.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>YOU’LL FEEL BETTER.</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Go away.” Yukio said, his heart beating a little faster.</p>
<p>“I think you must have been around… seven or eight years old. We had an imp in the house and it scared you shitless.”</p>
<p>Shiro watched him with a half-smile, but Yukio avoided his gaze and didn’t answer.</p>
<p>“Come on. You know what night I’m talking about. I know you do. Throw your old man a bone.”</p>
<p>Yukio exhaled. He knew he shouldn’t. Shouldn’t entertain the fancies of a demon. Or a ghost. Or a fantasy. Or whatever this was. But… he was conflicted. Something deep inside him wanted… wanted this to be real. Wanted… that face looking at him… to be the real face of the man he once knew as Father.</p>
<p>“…how could I forget it?” Yukio said reluctantly.</p>
<p>“I knew it! You—”</p>
<p>“You ABANDONED me—” Yukio interrupted, “—alone in the dark with a demon.” He glanced sidelong at Shiro, his eyes like daggers. “What kind of <em>father</em> does that?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>BWA HA HA HA HA!</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Shiro hesitated for a moment, his mind seemingly weighed down, but then he waved his hand lightly.</p>
<p>“Yeah, that’s not what actually went down.”</p>
<p>
  <em>How could he be so flippant?</em>
</p>
<p>“How can you deny it? I remember it <em>very </em>clearly.”</p>
<p>“Despite appearances, I didn’t<em> abandon </em>you.” Shiro leaned back against the end of an upside-down pew and stretched his legs out.</p>
<p>“I watched you walk away down the hall!”</p>
<p>“Yes, but what you don’t know, is that I sat just out of view in the stairwell.”</p>
<p>“Why?”</p>
<p>“I was waiting for you to turn the light on by yourself.”</p>
<p>“That… doesn’t make sense. You had the power to do it yourself. Why leave me alone to do it with a demon running loose?” Shiro crossed his arms and smirked a little bit.</p>
<p>“Well… to be honest… I have a little confession to make.”</p>
<p>“…What?”</p>
<p>“The imp was long dead even before I got home.”</p>
<p>“What?!”</p>
<p>“The monks found the imp lurking in the monastery, exorcised it, called and gave me a heads up… a couple hours before I returned. Soooo…”</p>
<p>“So… I was never in any real danger?”</p>
<p>“No, you weren’t.”</p>
<p>“You mean to tell me that… you let me wait around in the dark scared half to death for hours for nothing?!”</p>
<p>“It wasn’t for nothing; I was trying to teach you a valuable lesson!”</p>
<p>“I was terrified for my life. Isn’t that a cruel way to teach a lesson?”</p>
<p>“Well…” Shiro ran his hand through his hair. “Now, that I’m looking back on it… maybe a little… But sometimes you gotta use tough love to get a point across.”</p>
<p>“And was that really necessary?”</p>
<p>“Yes,” Shiro nodded.</p>
<p>“What?” Yukio looked at him surprised and confused.</p>
<p>“Do you know how long it took you to turn on the light?”</p>
<p>“You mean… how long I waited for you to come back?”</p>
<p>“Do you know how long I’ve waited for you to turn on the light?!” Shiro repeated, raising his voice.</p>
<p>“HOW LONG, <em>FATHER,</em> HOW LONG?!”</p>
<p>“I’M STILL WAITING!”</p>
<p>The answer came like a slap across Yukio’s face. Or had something actually slapped his face?</p>
<p>“I’m still waiting,” Shiro repeated, softer. “I waited until damn near midnight, but you never turned the light on. Finally, I gave up waiting and came out to check on you… and do you know what I found?”</p>
<p>Yukio scowled.</p>
<p>“You had left the safety of the circle seal—actually, you broke it—and hid under the table again. You took off your glasses and cried until your shirt was covered in tears and snot and eventually fell asleep with the knife in your hand again.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>YOU’RE PITIFUL.</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Yukio looked away, ashamed of his infantile wretchedness. He felt another drop of warm liquid drip from his eye and he wiped it off, adding another red streak to his sleeve.</p>
<p>“You never faced the demon and stepped into the light but kept hiding in the darkness feeling sorry for yourself.”</p>
<p>“What did you expect? I was seven!”</p>
<p>“Well you’re not seven years old now and you’re still doing that.”</p>
<p>“Don’t be ridiculous. I’m not weak and pathetic like I used to be.”</p>
<p>“No. You’re not. You’re stronger. And that makes you disillusioned and dangerous.”</p>
<p>“THE HELL I’M DISILLUSIONED. I’m more enlightened than I have been my entire life.”</p>
<p>“HAHAHA! Are you kidding me right now? You’re more lost than you ever were.”</p>
<p>Yukio opened his mouth to reply but Shiro cut him off.</p>
<p>“EVEN THOUGH Rin inherited all of Satan’s flame, I knew you still had just as much demon blood running through your veins. Even though you seemed like a normal human child, I knew darkness haunted your soul. And someday you’d have to face it.”</p>
<p>“So I did what I could. I worked hard to give you a good life. I taught you to be an exorcist and defend yourself. And when I died, I made sure you were sent to a place where you could make friends and allies—your own circle seal of safety. I did everything I could to take care of you until you could turn on the light for yourself and face the darkness.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>DO NOT RELY ON THIS. IT IS MERELY A FETTER.</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“When you finally realized the truth—you saw the imp—you found out that Satan parasitized your eye—instead of bringing it into the light, you kept it to yourself—and hid it in the darkness. And then, that circle of safety—your brother and your friends—you left it! You betrayed and abandoned them! All those things I did to help you? You’ve thrown them all away!”</p>
<p>Yukio leaped to his feet, fists balled.</p>
<p>“I DIDN’T THROW THEM AWAY! I’M PROTECTING THEM!”</p>
<p>“PROTECTING THEM MY ASS!” Shiro stood and motioned angrily. Yukio pointed to his bloodshot left eye.</p>
<p>“MY EYE IS PARASITIZED BY SATAN! THAT MAKES ME HIS SPY AND A CONDUIT FOR HIS POWER! I’M TOO DANGEROUS TO BE AROUND THEM!”</p>
<p>“IF YOU WANTED TO PROTECT THEM, YOU SHOULD HAVE BEEN UP-FRONT AND HONEST FROM THE GET-GO! BECAUSE YOU DECIDED TO BE ALL DARK AND MYSTERIOUS, THEY’VE FOLLOWED YOU TO A CRASHING ILLUMINATI AIRSHIP DEATH TRAP!”</p>
<p>“I DIDN’T ASK THEM TO COME!”</p>
<p>“THEY CAME BECAUSE THEY CARE ABOUT YOU!”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>DO NOT ACCEPT ANY LIMITATIONS!</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“IF THEY KNEW THE TRUTH, THEY’D HATE ME!”</p>
<p>“YOU DON’T KNOW THAT! THEY’RE NOT AS SHALLOW AS YOU THINK, BUT YOU WON’T EVEN ALLOW THEM THE OPPORTUNITY TO PROVE IT!”</p>
<p>“I CAN’T BURDEN THEM WITH MY TROUBLES! I’M THEIR TEACHER AND SUPERIOR!”</p>
<p>“Oh my god,” Shiro threw his hands up and walked away then turned and faced Yukio again. “Stop taking yourself so seriously. You’re all the same damn age. You all go to the same friggin’ high school classes. You are friends and comrades. And besides. Didn’t you abandon your teaching position when you ran away to the Illuminati? Can’t really use that as an excuse anymore…”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>SHOW ME AGAIN…</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“This isn’t some nuisance haunting, or possession by a low-level demon, or even a rampaging mid-level demon.” Yukio threw his hands out and motioned to the debris around them. “This is the war of Demon Kings and the Devil himself. This isn’t the students’ fight. It would be wrong to drag them into this. No, we need to—I need to solve this alone.”</p>
<p>Yukio could almost hear Shiro roll his eyes.</p>
<p>“Will ya quit with that already? No, you don’t have to do everything on your own. Everyone has their own troubles, but friends help each other out and bear each other’s burdens.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>HOW MUCH YOU’RE LIKE ME!</strong>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I’M NO FRIEND TO THEM! I share no part of their burdens. Instead of helping them, my own troubles overflow me and hurt them. I threatened Suguro with a gun! I pushed Shiemi! Shima and Miwa were endangered in the crossfire of our battle! What kind of friend does that?”</p>
<p>Shiro didn’t answer right away. He turned around and looked up at the stained-glass window on the left side of the sanctuary—what was left of it anyways. It was—or it used to be—a picture of Jesus reaching down to touch the head of a ragged child. When Yukio was a little boy, he used to imagine that he was that child, the unwanted bastard son of Satan, loved by the fatherly figure of God. All that was left was of the stained glass was the child, reaching upward into the storm clouds piling in the sky outside. Yukio shook his head. How foolish he was.</p>
<p>“It doesn’t matter if you aren’t a friend to them on your end,” Shiro answered. “They’ve already chosen to be a friend to you.” He looked from Shiro to the stained glass and back to Shiro.</p>
<p>“God abandoned me long ago—with good reason—so I can’t expect any human to care. And I don’t ask them to.”</p>
<p>Shiro stepped in front of Yukio, his head blocking the view of the storm clouds past the shattered window.</p>
<p>“HEY! YOU DON’T GET TO DECIDE WHO LOVES YOU AND WHO DOESN’T! FOR GOD’S SAKE LET THEM HELP YOU!”</p>
<p>“NO! EVERYONE I’VE EVER CARED ABOUT WILL BE KILLED!”</p>
<p>“YOU DON’T KNOW THAT GODDAMMIT! YOU’RE REALLY TRYING MY PATIENCE!”</p>
<p>“Then just LET ME GO!” Yukio shouted. The air and the building and their bones trembled momentarily as if some distant explosion shook them. Shiro hesitated, the fury in his eyes turned to apprehension. ‘<em>What was that?</em>’ Yukio turned away and his shoulders sagged.</p>
<p>“Just let me go. Let me leave this dream and go face my fate. Leave me alone.”</p>
<p>“I will never do that.”</p>
<p>“YOU ALREADY HAVE! YOU’RE DEAD, REMEMBER?!”</p>
<p>Shiro winced.</p>
<p>“If nothing else,” he said slowly, “stop pushing Rin away. He’s your brother and the only family you have left.”</p>
<p>“He’s an unstable Nephilim. I can’t rely on him.”</p>
<p>“He’s unstable because you keep pushing him over the edge!”</p>
<p>“That’s the plan. The human side of Rin has no hope of maintaining control over their shared corporeal body—the demon side is stronger and will win out eventually. The sooner that happens and we… deal with it… the better.”</p>
<p>“Good grief, Yukio, this is your brother we’re talking about. Sometimes I wonder if Rin really is the demon brother or if you are.”</p>
<p>“I’M NOT A DEMON!” Yukio stomped his foot. Cracks in the floor radiated outward from the impact and the paper scraps blew away.</p>
<p>“OH YEAH? TELL ME! WHO IS MORE OF A DEMON? The brother who inherited Satan’s flames but a heart big enough to encompass the world or the brother who hates himself, hides behind his fancy guns, and hurts and betrays everyone who cares about him?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <strong>UNLEASH YOURSELF!!!</strong>
</p>
<p>
  
</p>
<p>Black sparks launched from Yukio’s eye like a firework. Shiro had just enough time to raise a hand up and look away.</p>
<p>“I’M NOT A DEMON!” Yukio raged.</p>
<p>Dark fire exploded outward in an ever-growing sphere instantly burning up the paper scraps on the floor and in the air. Stones and rubble were shoved by the blasting winds. The earth shook and the stones of the monastery walls trembled and cracked with the impact of the deafening blast wave.</p>
<p>Shiro tumbled head over heels on waves of the stygian inferno and impacted the wall with a heavy thud.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Happy Halloween!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. The Lies in the Snow</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Shiro starts explaining his main point but then Yukio goes off on yet another self-depreciating rabbit trail.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Caution: Yukio's suicidal tendencies are mentioned. Shiro doesn't respond to them very well.</p><p>FYI: This chapter is less edited than usual but I'm posting it anyway because I'm tired and I'm about to start two weeks of 12-hour shifts and won't have time to write.</p><p>Send it!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The rumbling of the walls stilled as the last of the explosion died away. The pews had been pushed radially outward, all but the biggest blocks of rubble swept away by the hurricane winds. Flecks of ash—all that was left of the paper scrap confetti floated suspended in the air. At the center of the room, Yukio knelt on his knees, his hands and chest flickering with black flames returning to his body. The last of the flames sucked into his chest and he sagged forward, breathing heavily. He stared at his quaking hands.</p><p>“…was that me?”</p><p>Three bright red drops splattered on his palm. He reached for his eye with growing trepidation. It was bleeding again.</p><p>
  <em>My eye… it’s getting worse!</em>
</p><p>A piece of wood went flying, thrown from behind the jumble of pews lining the wall. Shiro grunted as he rolled a stone block off himself. He coughed, disentangled himself from a tattered tapestry, and stood up. Yukio looked at him, covering his face with his hand, blood dribbling between his fingers.</p><p>“What’s happening to me?”</p><p>Shiro stood and stared at him, trying to appear stoic, but sudden worry shadowed his features. He didn’t answer.</p><p>Something lightly touched Yukio’s other cheek and his gaze was drawn upward. The specks of white, once suspended, now drifted downward. Innumerable flakes crowded the air and whirled in unsees eddies of air. One of them landed on Yukio’s eyelash, but disappeared before he had the chance to touch it. Was it the ash? No, the ash had turned to…</p><p>“…Snow?” Yukio held out his hand. Several snowflakes dropped into his hand, pale white against the crimson blood that melted immediately. He looked at Shiro again. “What is going on?”</p><p>“We don’t have much time,” Shiro answered cryptically, “and I still haven’t said what I came to say.”</p><p>“…I don’t want to hear it.”</p><p>“Tough beans, kid,” Shiro said with wistful half-smile. He used to say that all the time to the boys. Yukio felt a pang of nostalgia for that simpler, happier time.</p><p><em>No!</em> Yukio rebuked himself. <em>Don’t fondly remember your childhood. It was a lie. </em></p><p>Shiro took off his sea blue scarf—(wait, had he been wearing that this whole time?!)—and pulled Yukio’s hand away from his eye.</p><p>“What are you—”</p><p>“Indulge me,” Shiro said wiping the blood away. Yukio knew he ought to slap away the imposter’s hand, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. When he was done, Shiro pressed the scarf into Yukio’s open, bloody hand.</p><p>
  <em>Do not accept the gift of the dead! Don’t be weak!</em>
</p><p>“Now,” Shiro said. “Bear with me for a second. Let us consider this: what if… everything you thought you knew is wrong?” Yukio rolled his eyes. It was pretty obvious that was the case. Hadn’t Shiro been listening to anything Yukio said?</p><p>“Now, I know you’ve already mentioned the whole ‘you just found out Satan’s parasitizing your eye, your one dad is a demon king and the other is a demon clone, True Cross is the Illuminati, and Satan intends to possess Rin’s body’ dealio, but what if… even that was a lie?”</p><p>
  <em>Lies upon lies?</em>
</p><p>“Not only that. What if everything you know about yourself is wrong?”</p><p>
  <em>I’m not Yukio Okumera? I’m… someone else?</em>
</p><p>“Don’t try to trick me or confuse me,” Yukio snapped.</p><p>“I’m not… but what if Satan is?”</p><p>“Lies? Secrecy? That isn’t really how he operates.”</p><p>“I know, I know, he seems more like a full-frontal-assault-with-hand-grenades kind-of-guy than a cloak-and-dagger kind-of-guy, but! What if that’s what he wants us to think? What if even that’s a lie?”</p><p>“Or maybe <em>you’re</em> the liar.”</p><p>“You know I’m not!” Shiro snapped. “Ah. This isn’t working. Let me take a different approach.” Shiro reached down and drew a small circular design in the snow.</p><p>
  <em>How can the snow already cover the ground already? It only just started to fall!</em>
</p><p>“How long do you think Satan been in your eye?” Shiro asked looking up again.</p><p>“…Since—” Blood dripped off Yukio’s face into the snow. He wiped his cheek and chin with the scarf and then held it to his eye.</p><p>“Kyoto, right?” Shiro interrupted. “When Satan’s flames appeared?” Yukio didn’t reply.</p><p>“Wrong!” Shiro held up a finger in the air to make a point. “Satan’s been parasitizing your eye since you were temptainted by Rin as a baby. <em>You’ve been parasitized since you were born.”</em></p><p>The gears turned in Yukio’s mind. It made sense. He’s been able to see demons for as long as he could remember. Satan must have been able to see through him from the very beginning.</p><p>“So this mean…”</p><p>He’d been a window for a very, very long time. Yukio was horrified.</p><p>“I’ve… been a danger to everyone… my whole life!”</p><p>“That’s… not where I was going with that…”</p><p>Yukio’s hand shook as he reached up and touched his bleeding eye, the scarf falling out of his hand onto the snow-dusted stone floor, staining it red.</p><p>“Satan’s… been able to see Rin this whole time! He’s been watching, spying on him… and it’s all my fault! I’ve unknowingly been a living time bomb, and now it’s primed to explode.”</p><p>“I should have known he’d jump to the wrong conclusion,” Shiro sighed facepalming.</p><p>“And everyone’s going to DIE because of me.”</p><p>“Calm down, Yukio. Don’t go down that rabbit trail.”</p><p>“I should have never been born! You old FOOL! Why did you let me live?! You should have slain me as a baby when you had the chance!”</p><p>“YOU’RE DAMN WRONG! DON’T TALK LIKE THAT!”</p><p>“I’M DAMN RIGHT, OLD MAN! And because you failed your duty, I was RIGHT to try to do it myself. I was RIGHT to try and force Rin’s hand, and make him kill me.”</p><p>“Yeah, that’s gotta stop right now. You can’t keep shooting people who love you. That’s a pretty bad habit to have.”</p><p>“It’s the only way to solve this.”</p><p>“Coward.”</p><p>“What did you just call me?” Yukio bristled.</p><p>“YOU HEARD ME RIGHT! You’re a coward!”</p><p>“WHAT PART ABOUT THIS WHOLE SITUATION SCREAMS COWARD TO YOU?”</p><p>“YOU’RE TRYING SO HARD TO AVOID DOING THE ONE THING THAT WILL SAVE YOU BECAUSE IT’S HARD AND YOU’RE SCARED. YOU’RE TRYING SO HARD TO AVOID IT THAT YOU’RE WILLING TO TAKE THE EASY WAY OUT! WHAT ABOUT THAT SOUNDS BRAVE TO YOU?!”</p><p>“YOU THINK SUICIDE IS EASY?”</p><p> </p><p>“YUKIO!”</p><p> </p><p>The word, clear as day, resounded through the sanctuary like lightning. Yukio’s head jerked up and he looked around in shock.</p><p>“Rin?”</p><p>Shiro eyed the air suspiciously and shook his head.</p><p>“An echo,” he explained, “I suspect what’s happening to you in reality is echoing into the dream.”</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>LET YOUR BROTHER GO.</strong>
</p><p>
  
</p><p> </p><p>“That idiot,” Yukio sighed and shook his head. “he wouldn’t do it. He wouldn’t kill me.”</p><p>“Of course, he wouldn’t.”</p><p>“He has to! That’s the only way to stop this!”</p><p>“Here we go again…”</p><p>“Rin’s going to get himself possessed and everyone else killed! You know as well as I do, the only way to stop Satan is to break the link he has to Assiah. I have to die.” Blood ran freely down Yukio’s face from his eye and dripped onto the front his shirt. The scarf lay on the ground cast aside and covered in snow.</p><p>“Calm down, Yukio.”</p><p>“Why doesn’t he ever listen to me? Why doesn’t he ever do what he’s told?”</p><p>“You’re both trying to save each other’s lives.”</p><p>“He’s so dense! He’s so blind, he can’t see the big picture!”</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>HE TOO IS BUT A FETTER.</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>“He’s got better vision than you right now because you’re looking at the wrong damn picture!”</p><p>“I don’t see any other way out of this situation. Rin’s a good person, but that demon inside him…”</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>AND HE IS WARPING INTO A MONSTER!</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>“He’s not a stable Nephilim.”</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>HE’S EVEN DISAPPOINTED IN HIMSELF!</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>“Stop pushing him away, Yukio! He’s trying to help you!”</p><p>“I DIDN’T ASK FOR HIS HELP!”</p><p>“He’s the only family you have left! And you’re the only family that he has left!”</p><p>“THAT’S WHERE YOU’RE WRONG!”</p><p>“WELL I DON’T EXACTLY SEE ANY AUNTS, UNCLES, COUSINS, OR GRANDPARENTS RUNNING AROUND, DO YOU?”</p><p>“RIN’S GOT THE OTHERS! HE’S GOT—he’s got… Shiemi and Ryuji and Shura, and the other ExWires. He’s not alone… he’s built a family for himself—he doesn’t need me. He never did.”</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>SO LET HIM GO.</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>“Yukio.”</p><p>“He’s better off without me.”</p><p>“That’s a damn lie.”</p><p>“NO, YOU’RE THE LIE!”</p><p>CRASH! Behind them, several stone blocks fell from a hole in the roof and crashed into the snowy floor.</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>HYA HA HA!</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>Yukio flinched. He wiped his nose and smeared blood across his sleeve. Now his nose was bleeding too. Shiro’s eyes narrowed.</p><p>
  
</p><p>
  <strong>YOU ACTUALLY DID IT?!</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>“The monastery is falling apart?” Yukio eyed what was left of the roof.</p><p>“You’re losing control. The dream is falling apart.” Shiro pointed to the faintly glowing circle seal in the snow at his feet. “I’ve cast a seal to slow the dream’s deterioration and preserve this space as long as possible, but it won’t last long.”</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>HUH?!</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>“You can do that in a dream?” Yukio asked incredulous.</p><p>“You forget,” Shiro bragged poking his thumb into his chest. “I’m one hell of an exorcist.”</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>TCH… YOU STUBBORN FOOL!</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>Yukio screamed as something stabbed his eye. Fresh blood spurted out of it and splattered on his shirt and the ground. He clawed at his face to remove whatever stabbed him, but nothing was there. Some invisible force squeezed his waist forcing the air out of his lungs.</p><p>“Stop!” He gasped, begging the empty air. “Let me go!”</p><p>“Hold on, Yukio! It’ll pass! You just gotta bear it!” Shiro’s voice cut through the pain.</p><p>He suddenly felt very light and weak. The vision in his good eye blurred and he couldn’t focus.</p><p>“I’m… falling…”</p><p>“Stay awake dammit!”</p><p>The world disappeared.</p><p> </p><p>“Yukio!”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Most of my stories I plan meticulously, but this one I kinda just turn on intense music, let myself be enveloped in strong emotions, and write madly. This is definitely not my best quality work, but for some reason it’s gotten a shocking number of bookmarks and subscriptions (thank you everyone!!!). I can’t help but wonder, is this a better way to write??</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. The Voice in the Night</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Shiro breaks through to Yukio. Yukio breaks through to Shiro. Satan breaks through the protective seal. And someone unexpected breaks through into the dreamspace.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>*Update* I rewrote the last scene of the chapter to increase suffering and decrease weirdness.</p><p>Theme song is “Hovering Over the Waters” by City of the Fallen.</p><p>This is the first chapter I have written so far where I haven’t been completely sleep-deprived (I’m finally back on day shift! Yay!). Consequently, it is pretty intense so I added the violence warning. Though there isn't actually a whole lot of violence, there's a good bit of blood. (Aaand there's more of it to come [sorry Yukio]).</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>
  <em>“Yes… that would be nice.”</em>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Yukio shifted painfully. Everything hurt. His mind was numb. His heart ached and he didn’t know why. He lifted his face and shoulders off the ground with one arm. The blurry form of Shiro sat on the non-splintered end of a quartered pew with arms and ankles crossed.</p><p>“Oh thank God you’re back! I thought for sure you had given up.”</p><p>Yukio’s head sagged and he rested his blood-damp forehead on his arm. His breath puffed out white in the cold air and floated upward from around his prone shoulders.</p><p>“Damn.”</p><p>“Yeah, you’re still here. No rest for the weary, eh? Sorry kid.”</p><p>Yukio raised his head again, his vision clearing. He was still in the sanctuary. The snow was now two inches deep and still falling through the hole blown in the ceiling. A cold wind eddied the falling flakes along the shells of the wall. Yukio shielded his face from the flakes that blew low across the ground.</p><p>“How… how is… how are you… and all of this still here?” He asked once the wind had passed.</p><p>“Magic!” Shiro waved his arms around mysteriously. “Ooooh!” Yukio glared at him. Shiro shrugged and pointed to the ground next to Yukio.</p><p>“Recognize it?”</p><p>Yukio raised his upper body further off the ground to get a better view. Lines of dark purple light shimmered in the snow tracing a circular pattern around him. It was a circle seal, like the one he’d drawn earlier in the snow, but this time much larger.</p><p>Just like when he was a kid.</p><p>“I made an anchor,” Shiro grinned.</p><p>“None of this makes any sense,” Yukio said in an almost-whiney voice. With a lot of effort, he rolled to his side then flopped onto his back. The snow that had dusted his back while he was unconscious melted, penetrating his thin shirt and chilling him. Instinct ordered him to get off the cold ground, but his exhausted body said otherwise. Besides, maybe the cold was a blessing in disguise, a way to numb the pain. He stared at the hypnotically swirling flakes in the dark purplish sky. How silent it was! He’d forgotten how quiet falling snow was. Shiro’s face appeared above him blocking his view.</p><p>“Are you going to get up or just keep lying there feeling sorry for yourself?”</p><p>
  <em>“I suddenly felt weak… hm?”</em>
</p><p>“Too tired.”</p><p>“Ah. Just as well. Means that you’re my captive audience.” Shiro took a seat again on his quartered pew.</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>YOU CANNOT HELP HIM NOW!</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>“I need you to shut up.” Shiro growled.</p><p>“I wasn’t… saying anything.” Yukio said glancing at him sidelong.</p><p>“Yeah, but as soon as I start talking, you’re going to interrupt me and go off on some wild tangent.”</p><p>“Why don’t <em>you</em> stop talking?”</p><p>“Are you seriously still trying to get rid of me? If nothing else, you sure are tenacious.”</p><p>“I—”</p><p>“Ah-ah! Nope! Shut up! I’m not done yet so don’t distract me.”</p><p>Yukio looked annoyed but bit his tongue. Shiro glanced at the circle seal. The violet light flickered like the low flames of a gas stove.</p><p>“This is my first time casting circle seals in a dream-realm. I don’t know how long it will last, so we need to get down to business.”</p><p>
  <em>“Carry me on your back.”</em>
</p><p>Yukio pushed himself up to a sitting position and leaned back heavily. His hands ached from contact with the snow and icy stone floor, but he ignored it.</p><p>“As I was saying, Satan’s been in your eye since you were born. That means, everything you know has been tinted Satan-colored.”</p><p><em>Lovely. Satan-colored.</em> The voice of Mephisto echoed in Yukio’s mind. Right before he tried to shoot him…</p><p>“Your whole life, you’ve been constantly exposed to the darkness of Gehenna through the window—the tiny Gehenna-Gate—in your eye. Everything you see—your perceptions, your worldview—have been warped and maybe even controlled by the demonic forces of Gehenna. You see what they want you to see. They’re shaping your perceptions to manipulate and control you, to get you to do what they want. Everything you think you know, it’s what <em>they</em> want you to think.”</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>SO GIVE UP!</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>“And Satan has been whispering in your ear for as long as you remember repeating what he wanted you to think— ‘You’re weak! ‘You’re a failure!’ ‘You are unworthy of love!’—until you believed them to be true and immutable facts about yourself.” He waved his arms as if to say <em>tada! </em>“Well I’m here to tell you that everything you think you know about the world and about yourself is wrong and you can’t trust what you see and hear.”</p><p>Yukio didn’t say anything, but sat there staring at Shiro with a dark unreadable expression. Shiro stared back. Around them, another chill breeze moaned through the broken stained-glass window. A small cloud of snow stirred up between them and swirled around the circle seal like an icy apparition—a snow ghost, as Yukio had always called the natural phenomena.</p><p>
  <em>“Tee hee!”</em>
</p><p>“If everything’s a lie,” Yukio began slowly as he leaned forward draping his nearly-numbed forearms over his lap, “and I can’t trust my senses, how can I ever know the truth?” Shiro inhaled deeply, leaned back and crossed his arms again with a slightly triumphant face.</p><p>“Ain’t that a philosophical question for the ages?”</p><p>Yukio’s eyes flared with instantaneous fury. His body stiffened and his fists gripped into fists.</p><p>“WHY DID YOU COME?!”</p><p>“Hey hey! There’s that Yukio rage we all know and love. I was beginning to worry that that last attack had just about done you in.”</p><p>“You act like you came here to help me out or something but you’re making me even more confused!” Yukio got on his knees and then stood up.</p><p>“Well if you’d let me finish my thought before you keep going all explosive on me, maybe it’d make sense.”</p><p>“ARE YOU EVER GOING TO BE DONE?” Yukio gripped his head with his hands and then motioned angrily. “This conversation is dragging on and on! Just spit it out and be done with it!”</p><p>“You ought to be careful what you wish for, boy,” Shiro said severely. Invisible sparks flew as the boy’s wrathful stare met the steely gaze of the solidly resolute man. Without warning, Yukio winced and squeezed his eyes shut as a sharp sting shot through his eye and into his brain. He leaned forward, blood from his eye dripped between his fingers and melted dark splotches through the snow.</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>IF YOU GIVE UP… IT’S MUCH EASIER!</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>“Yukio.”</p><p>“WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?” Yukio had the look of a madman, poised to fight, covered in blood, and seething with ferocity.</p><p>“Why are you so mad at me?”</p><p>“Isn’t it obvious?”</p><p>“I want you to say it out loud.”</p><p>“I ALREADY HAVE! WEREN’T YOU LISTENING?”</p><p>“I want you to say it again.”</p><p>“WHY SHOULD I?”</p><p>“Because I won’t leave you alone until you do.” Shiro stepped toward Yukio as if in challenge. “So tell me, why are you so mad at me?”</p><p>“Because you FUCKING DIED!” Yukio’s cry pierced the cold snow like a gunshot. It reverberated through the crumbling walls in echoing whispers until an arctic wind gusted through fractures in the rocks and the gaping window frames and blew away the sound.</p><p>“You died.” Yukio said again, his voice slightly tremulous. Tears threatened to roll down his bruised and bloodied face but he forced them back, swallowing down his emotions. “You left and never came back.”</p><p>Shiro stood motionless.</p><p>“You said goodbye to Rin and not to me.” Yukio turned the other away and looked up at the sky, fiercely blinked back the tears. He wiped his eyes with his sleeve, smearing blood across his cheek toward his ear. He turned back suddenly with accusation in his reddened eyes.</p><p>“Why don’t you just admit it? You love Rin more than me! You never even loved me in the first place!” He stomped his foot angrily. “And for some reason, suddenly you’re here, acting like you care or something. And it’s HURTING ME because I know it’s a lie.”</p><p>“Did you come just to hurt me more? Haven’t I had enough pain and suffering to last a lifetime?” Unable to be contained any longer, tears freely rolled down Yukio’s face, mingling with melting snowflakes, snot, and blood. His breath heaved with emotion.</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>IF YOU GIVE UP… IT’S MUCH EASIER!</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>“Yukio…” Shiro reached out his hand.</p><p>Yukio exhaled slowly, the tensity leaving his body. He slumped forward with defeat and swayed concerningly. Shiro stepped forward and caught him, enveloping him in a hug.</p><p><em>“You should’ve just stayed dead.”</em> Yukio gave up, melting into his arms. His legs threatened to give out and Shiro held him tighter.</p><p>“Is this what you’ve thought all these years?” Shiro asked with a warbling voice. “That I didn’t love you?”</p><p>“It doesn’t matter anymore,” Yukio said bitterly.</p><p>“I love you Yukio. And I can’t let you go. That’s why I came. Because I care about you. I hate watching you go through hell alone.”</p><p>“It can’t be helped. You’re dead.”</p><p>“I know. I’m sorry I’m dead. I’m so sorry.”</p><p>“I just hope that… soon, I will be dead too.”</p><p>Shiro’s breath caught in his throat.</p><p>“Yukio.” Shiro released him from the embrace and held him at arm’s length, gripping his shoulders. Yukio’s mouth hung slightly open and the light in his eyes had gone out. It was like he was already dead inside.</p><p>“Yukio, that is not acceptable.”</p><p>Yukio blinked and closed his mouth. Shiro squeezed his shoulders and stared him dead in the eye.</p><p>“I do not give you permission to die.”</p><p>“It’s my life,” Yukio said dully. “You don’t have any say over it.”</p><p>“The hell I don’t. <em>I’m your father and you’re my son!</em>”</p><p>Yukio stiffened. He wiped his face on his sleeve and then batted Shiro’s arm away. He stepped back and let out a heartrending wail.</p><p>“PLEASE! Just let me go!” He swung his fist at Shiro with very little coordination and power. Without flinching, Shiro blocked Yukio’s fist and grabbed his arm. “I’m so tired.” Yukio’s knees buckled and Shiro caught his elbows.</p><p>“Your life isn’t only your own,” Shiro said, holding him up by his elbows. “It also belongs to those who love you. You don’t have the right to take it from them.”</p><p>
  <em>WEEEeeeeyooooo…</em>
</p><p>The air vibrated slightly as a strange humming noise died away—<em>had that noise bee there the whole time?</em> The world darkened and the sky rumbled with thunder. Both Yukio and Shiro’s eyes went wide and they looked down at the snow between them. The low flames flickered and died away leaving only shadowy lines in the snow where Shiro had drawn the pattern… and a smudged shoeprint where Yukio’s foot had broken the seal.</p><p>“I broke it,” Yukio said dumbly. He straightened himself and staggered back.</p><p>“It’s okay. It was an accident.”</p><p>“…what’s going to happen now?”</p><p>“The seal protected the dream from collapse, and now it’s broken… the dream will start to disintegrate quick, fast, and in a hurry.”</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>IF YOU GIVE UP… IT’S MUCH EASIER!</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>“Can you reform the seal?”</p><p>“No. Sorry.” Shiro shook his head. “It’s already too late.” He held up his arms. His hands had already begun to fade, turning translucent and ghostly. Yukio reached out his hand and tried to touch Shiro’s but it went straight through.</p><p>“Things are about to go downhill fast, but you can endure it. It’ll probably be painful, but you’re strong and I know you can survive.”</p><p>
  <em>“I wish Shura could have come.”</em>
</p><p>“Sh—Shura?” Yukio said his eyebrows knitting together in confusion. Shiro’s eyes went wide. He spun around and took a couple of steps, clearly disturbed, and raised his shaking spectral hands.</p><p>“Who’s the woman’s voice?” Yukio asked. Shiro turned back and looked at Yukio, stunned.</p><p>“How are you doing this—how is this happening?” He asked loudly.</p><p>“What?” Yukio watched him dumbfounded.</p><p>“It seems that this isn’t just reality that’s bleeding into the dream… it’s also my memories!”</p><p>“Maybe… when you cast the anchor, the circle seal, this became <em>your</em> dream, just as much as it is mine.”</p><p>“Damn.” They looked at the remains of the seal etched in the snow. Shiro smirked. “I knew I was good, but… I didn’t know I was <em>that </em>good.”</p><p>“Who’s the woman’s voice?” Yukio asked again impatiently.</p><p><em>“</em>Hehe, funny story.” Shiro laughed nervously. <em>“It’s your mother.”</em></p><p>Yukio was astounded.</p><p>“My mother?!” He inhaled sharply. “MY MOTHER? You remember my mother?! …YOU KNEW HER THIS WHOLE TIME?!”</p><p>“Uh… yeah,” Shiro replied sheepishly. “We’ve actually known eachother… since we were little kids.”</p><p>“What is she saying? I can barely hear her.” Yukio turned his head side to side, trying to hear her better.</p><p>“Her voice is quiet because she was dying."</p><p>
  <em>“Actually, she thinks we’re engaged! Tee hee…”</em>
  
</p><p>“What?” Yukio cocked his head to the side. “Mother?”</p><p>“It’s just a memory, Yukio. She can’t hear you.”</p><p>“So she isn’t… here? Like you are?”</p><p>Shiro shook his head sadly.</p><p>“I wish… but… no.”</p><p>“Why did you lie? Why didn’t you tell us?”</p><p>“I didn’t want… questions… I couldn’t—shouldn’t—answer. I wanted to protect you and Rin, to keep you from getting hurt.”</p><p>“TELL ME THE TRUTH! TELL ME EVERYTHING! TELL ME—AUGH!!” He coughed and choked, dropping to his knees. Shiro tried to reach out and grab him, but his hands had disappeared entirely. His two empty sleeves flopped uselessly against Yukio’s arm as he fell. Shiro watched helpless as Yukio gagged and heaved up a splatter of blood. He hunched over on all fours, threw up again, and gasped for breath.</p><p>“I’m sorry—I… I want to tell you everything, but… we just don’t have time.”</p><p>Yukio turned his head and looked up at him, unable to speak, but the fear and confusion in his eyes spoke clearly enough. What’s happening to me? </p><p>“You tried to kill yourself by drowning, right?”</p><p>Yukio screwed up his face like he was trying to hold something back. He nodded once, blood dribbling from the corner of his mouth.</p><p>“I think you’re finally succeeding.”</p><p>Yukio couldn’t hold it back any longer. Blood erupted from his mouth and spilled down his front. He coughed a wet cough and the inhale rattled in his chest. He grabbed the front of his shirt and wheezed, knives attacking his lungs.</p><p>Not enough air.</p><p>“Stay with me, Yukio.” Shiro dropped to his knees next to him. “Just keep trying to breathe. This’ll pass.” Yukio only had room in his lungs for a shallow breath. His chest felt like it was being crushed. He squeezed his eyes shut and coughed up more blood, the splatters cutting dark, lacy chasms in the snow.</p><p>Not enough air.</p><p>His heart raced with terror. He choked on the blood rising up his throat. He leaned over and put his head in the snow trying to use gravity to drain the fluid from his lungs. His chest lurched, trying to cough, trying to breathe but with no room for air.</p><p>Not enough air.</p><p>“We’re almost there, but I need you to stay with me just a little longer, because—” his mouth turned up slightly at the corner— “I’m still not done talking yet.” Yukio shot him an exasperated look.</p><p>Blinding white pain exploded in his skull. A spray erupted from the top of his head and a river of blood rushed down the back and sides of his head. Yukio didn’t even cry out. He just collapsed like a rag doll.</p><p>“YUKIO!!!”</p><p>Yukio lay curled up on his side bleeding from his eyes, ears, nose, and skull. Shiro knelt over him in the newly-formed puddle of blood unable to tell from his half-opened glazed-over eyes if he was unconscious or dead.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Tomorrow is the Winter Solstice, the longest night of the year. I wish you all peace, hope, light, and unconditional love during the long hours of the dark night and the rest of this holiday season! Stay safe and stay strong!</p><p>***UPDATE***<br/>I'm sorry I've left this right before the climax and conclusion! I'm in the process of moving to another country, and my Blue Exorcist special interest is "sleeping." [I'm currently elbow deep in a Hollow Knight special interest phase.] I'll probably come back to this story after the next manga issue comes out in April.</p><p>***11Apr UPDATE***<br/>The next chapter is now inwork. This little break has done me good.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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